Communiqué of the Governmental Advisory Committee (8 March 2000)

WEDNESDAY, 8 MARCH 2000 - The Governmental Advisory Committee of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers held its fifth meeting yesterday and today in Cairo. The attending Committee members, representing 29 national governments, distinct economies as recognised in international fora, and multinational governmental and treaty organisations, reflecting representation from all of ICANN's geographic regions, issued the following statement:

The Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC) has had fruitful discussions around substantive issues relating to the usage of the Internet across the worldwide community, ICANN activities, and the administration of the country code top level domains:

A. With regard to the addition of new generic top level domains (gTLDs):

Considering the possibility of expanding the domain name space, the addition of new gTLDs should be done thoughtfully and through a consensus based process. New gTLDs for specific uses, as well as for more generic, or 'open' registration, should be fully considered.

Recognising ICANN's responsibilities to achieve consensus in the creation of any new gTLDs, ICANN should avoid, in the creation of new gTLDs the alpha-3 codes of ISO 3166-1; well known and famous country, territory or regional language or people descriptions; or ISO 639 codes for representation of languages, unless in agreement with the relevant governments or public authorities.

B. With regard to the delegation and administration of country code top level domains (ccTLDs):

The GAC Document "Principles for the Delegation and Administration of Country Code Top Level Domains" represents the views of the national governments, distinct economies and multinational governmental and treaty organisations that comprise the GAC. The text of the document is the result of careful consideration by the GAC, and stands as a whole.

The GAC engaged in a discussion with the ccTLD Constituency of the DNSO on issues concerning administration and delegation of ccTLDs. The GAC notes the invitation by the representatives of the ccTLD Constituency to participate in further constructive discussions regarding the framework for administration and delegation of ccTLDs, with a view towards providing advice to the ICANN Board by its next meeting in Yokohama.

The GAC welcomes this goal and believes that further discussions will be most productive after the ccTLD Constituency has agreed upon a unified text. The GAC also welcomes the efforts of the ccTLD community to develop best practices.

C. With regard to ICANN's At Large Membership and process:

Given the significance of the At-Large Membership and elections to the ICANN process, the manner in which the process is conducted is of significant interest to the GAC. The GAC considers that priority on the establishment of an At-Large Membership should be in establishing a fair and effective process for elections. As ICANN moves forward, the GAC urges ICANN to consider the extension of the September 30 deadline, if necessary, in order to meet this important objective.
The need to reflect language diversity, as an essential element for the fairness of elections, was also emphasised.

D. With regard to future workplans:

The GAC has identified areas of future consideration, including

• issues in relation to ICANN's present documentation for the identification of current ccTLD administrators
• ICANN funding and budget
• further discussion on intellectual and other property issues, including warehousing and speculation in domain names
• international character sets within the DNS
• further discussion on ISO 3166
• further discussion on new gTLDs

The GAC thanks the Egyptian government, the Cairo Host Committee, the Internet Society of Egypt and the sponsors for hosting its meeting.

The next face-to-face meeting of the GAC will be held in Yokohama to coincide with ICANN's next round of meetings.